down on bended knee
by thelilacfield
Summary: Can we go back to the days our love was strong?/Oh God give me a reason, I'm down on bended knee.


**Please don't click back when you see the beginning! I promise, the angst is the good kind!**

* * *

><p><span>down on bended knee<span>

"_Blaine, we need to talk."_

"_I just can't look past something like this."_

"_It's still cheating, Blaine, whether your judgement was impaired or not."_

"_Kurt…please…just please."_

"_I'm sorry, Blaine. I'm breaking up with you."_

…

"_Oh my God, Kurt, what happened?"_

"…_I just broke up with Blaine."_

"_Oh, Kurt…come here."_

…

"_Blaine, dude, what's wrong with you?"_

"…_Kurt dumped me."_

"…_That's rough, man."_

* * *

><p>Breaking open another box of tissues, Rachel curled up against the edge of her bed, biting her lip as she met Quinn's eyes. No one seemed to know what to do. Moonlight sliced through the gap between the curtains, illuminated the tear-stained wreck of a boy sitting on the bed, Mercedes and Tina trying to comfort him.<p>

"But _why_?" Brittany asked for the hundredth time in the past hour. She was yet to receive an answer to her question. Santana just held her hand and pulled her closer while Rachel and Quinn sat awkwardly, Mercedes and Tina murmured words of comfort that had ceased to make any sense and Kurt sobbed.

"I'm going to ask my dads if you can all stay here tonight," Rachel murmured awkwardly, getting carefully to her feet and tiptoeing across the room, trying not to disturb the quiet of mourning.

"I'll come with you," Quinn offered, picking her way around the tangle of sprawled limbs that was Brittany and Santana. "Good idea," she murmured as Rachel quietly clicked the door shut. "I don't think Kurt should be alone tonight." Rachel just nodded in agreement.

Returning to the room a few minutes later, the pair found that Brittany and Santana were now comforting Kurt while Tina and Mercedes texted frantically. "What are you doing?" Quinn asked as Rachel handed Brittany another box of tissues and sat down by Tina. "I know you two like your gossip but this is really quite insensitive."

"We're actually texting Mike and Rory," Mercedes said defensively. "We're seeing if they've got anything out of Blaine yet."

"Poor guy's in a similar state," Tina said sympathetically, casting a look to Kurt. "Been crying for the past few hours, and we all know the guys aren't the best at comfort."

"As long as he's kept away from Puck," Quinn said, sliding into a spot beside Rachel. "The idiot would only make it worse."

For a while the group remained silent but for Kurt's stifled sobs and Brittany's mumbled comforting. Santana helped Rachel and Mercedes dig out enough bedding and blow-up mattresses for the seven of them, Tina and Rachel pumping up the mattresses while Quinn made the beds neatly and beat pillows into comfortable submission.

Around eleven, Rachel dads bade them goodnight, telling them to get a decent amount of sleep. Smiling at the two men, Rachel kissed them both goodnight and returned to her room, turning on the light on her nightstand and allocating the blow-up mattresses to herself, Quinn, Santana and Tina, leaving the bed for Kurt, Brittany and Mercedes.

"Will you tell us why now, Kurt?" Brittany asked softly, sweeping a bundle of tear-soaked tissues onto the floor and moving closer to the boy. Kurt sniffed and nodded.

"Do you remember I told you about Sebastian and when he took us to the gay bar?" he asked to nods from all six girls. "We went again last night because Sebastian wants to make it a once-a-month thing. Of course Blaine got drunk again and danced with Sebastian all night. I met Dave at the bar again and we talked for a while. He said something about the two guys on the dance floor looking familiar and I turned around to see…to see…" Tears trickled down his cheeks and Mercedes and Tina were instantly at his side.

"It's alright," Tina murmured, pulling a tissue from the box and wiping his eyes gently. "You don't have to tell us if it upsets you."

"No, I _need_ to tell someone," Kurt whispered, his voice thick with emotion. "I turned around and I saw Blaine. He was kissing Sebastian. Dave saw too and he walked me out to my car. He promised he'd teach Sebastian a lesson and I drove home. Blaine called me the next day, apologising and saying how Sebastian means nothing to him and how he loves me. I said I would try to look past it, but I can't, I just can't. I broke up with him today."

"Oh, _Kurt_," Mercedes whispered, looking close to tears herself. She wrapped the boy in a hug, joined by Tina on one side and Brittany on the other.

"We'll take care of you," Quinn promised. "We won't ever let you get hurt again."

"Give me this Sebastian's room number at Dalton and I'll make him wish he never even looked at Blaine," Santana growled, pounding her fist into the other hand as if imagining Sebastian's face.

"I don't mean to intrude, but perhaps we should sleep now," Rachel said softly, scared of complaints. But everyone just nodded and, after the complicated performance of getting themselves prepared for bed, curled up on their respective mattresses and tried to pretend they couldn't hear Kurt's sobbing all through the night.

The next morning began with cleaning up the tissues carpeting the floor, pulling sheets from blow-up mattresses and jumping to force the air out of them and Kurt's tearful refusals to go to school. "I can't face him," he murmured over and over again despite all the persuasions of the girls.

"Kurt, you know you'll have to face him some time, whether it's today or in a month," Quinn said softly, gesturing to the others to continue getting themselves ready. "It's better to face him today, then you can start to get over him."

"I don't want to get over him!" Kurt shouted ferociously. Quinn flinched away from him and his face crumpled. He slumped against her and she held him as he cried, mouthing orders to Mercedes over his shoulder.

"I feel so bad for him," Santana said as her and Tina shared the well-illuminated mirror in the bathroom to apply their make-up. "I mean, this bitch of a guy kisses his guy and all Kurt can do is cry."

"Not everyone tends towards violence as much as you do, Santana," Tina said, carefully outlining her eyes. "Kurt and Blaine just collapse when this sort of thing happens, they can't cope. Kurt needs us more than he ever has before. Are you ready for it?"

"I'm always ready to break a few noses for my boy," Santana promised with a smirk. "I better ask Mercedes and Puck if they feel like a little field trip to Dalton."

While Quinn traded the place of supporter with Rachel and Brittany murmured words of comfort that barely made sense, Mercedes thought of Sebastian, who had wrecked a perfect love, and hoped to introduce her fist to his face.

They arrived at school in two groups, Rachel driving Quinn, Santana and Brittany while Mercedes drove Tina and Kurt. Tina held the boy's hand tightly for the whole drive, prepared with tissues and comfort for the first sighting. While Santana glared at those who threatened to ogle the sight of the infamous Kurt Hummel in tears and Rachel and Quinn watched for Blaine, Brittany and Tina supported Kurt, Mercedes at the back of the group with warnings for anyone who opened their mouth.

"Shoot, Blaine's over there!" Quinn exclaimed, pointing over the colourful crowd to where Blaine met Mike and Rory at the doors.

"We'll go in the side door," Santana muttered back, changing direction and smirking as the other six followed her mindlessly, Brittany keeping Kurt's attention from where Blaine stood.

Alas, they couldn't keep the two from each other forever. As they pulled textbooks from their lockers, smiling at pictures pinned up inside the doors, Tina mentally smacked herself as Kurt saw the pictures of Blaine inside his locker and his face crumpled.

"Kurt?" The boy wheeled round to find Blaine behind him. At the sight of him, Kurt burst into tears and turned to Rachel.

Glaring at Blaine, Quinn and Mercedes helped the tiny diva move Kurt, who seemed unable to support his own weight, to a more private place, Tina and Brittany producing tissues from their pockets and following them hurriedly while Santana bellowed, "Nothing to see here!" to the expectant crowds as she ran after them.

None of them went to their first period classes, instead remaining locked in a dark unused classroom, comforting Kurt and wondering what to do.

* * *

><p>Two months passed. Two tearful months filled with long awkward silences, many sleepovers at various people's homes and ever more elaborate comfort schemes. Quinn and Tina had an argument with Finn when the boy's brand of comfort left Kurt crying for hours. Santana filled those who didn't know in on the situation and did indeed take her field trip to Dalton. However, Quinn and Rachel followed her and bodily removed her from the school before she could find Sebastian.<p>

One fateful morning in March, when a freezing wind bit at bare skin and blew umbrellas inside out, Kurt opened his locker to find the words _I'M SORRY_ glued there, spelt out in letters torn from magazines and newspapers. He found the same words in his Calculus textbook, glued to a piece of card in his bag and stuck to the table where he sat in the cafeteria.

At the New Directions meeting after school, when people voted in their choices for Regionals and Puck played his guitar for them all, Blaine stood up. "I have a song I want to sing," he said. "It's a song for you, Kurt."

"Okay, stop right there, Hobbit," Santana ordered, getting angrily to her feet. "Maybe we all sing about our feelings a lot, but a song isn't going to fix what you did to Kurt." She sat down again, putting a comforting hand on Kurt's shoulder.

When Rachel gave Kurt his usual ride home that afternoon and both Mercedes and Tina insisted on walking him to the door, Kurt was suspicious. Blaine had spoken with Santana after glee and both of them had disappeared since. Brittany had asked for his address. Mercedes and Tina, despite living in the opposite direction, had asked for a ride from Rachel and insisted she go by Kurt's first.

When Kurt walked into his home, he found it apparently empty, but not in complete darkness. Candles lit a path up the stairs, candles placed in glass dishes and surrounded by roses that filled the house with their sweet, musky scent. Tina and Mercedes quickly arranged their expressions from smug triumph to appropriate shock as Kurt walked slowly up the stairs, pausing to read the words _I'M SORRY _pinned to the wall in all manner of places, from right by the top of the stairs to above the door to his bedroom.

Santana, Brittany and Tina were already in there, sitting on the bed, each holding a candle, with enormous bouquets of roses in their laps. Tina smiled at him as he walked in, as did Brittany, and Santana smirked. Turning to the other side of the room, he found Mike and Rory sitting there, also holding candles, and asked, "Are we having an impromptu glee club meeting in my room that I wasn't informed about?"

"Don't be silly," Quinn murmured, her and Rachel appearing out of nowhere as they lit more candles, arranging yet more roses around the flickering flames. "We brought you here and organised all this because there's a little something we want to say to you."

"Why is my closet door open?" Kurt asked, storming across the room to close it. "I've told you not to go in there!" There was a muffled thud and an outbreak of snorting laughter as he shut the door and turned to the others in the room, demanding an explanation. They just smiled as the excitedly giggling Brittany leant over and pressed a button on the speakers and gentle music began to play, filling the room with its sweet sentimental sound. The girls, Mike and Rory turned to the closet door, which had opened again, Brittany and Rachel letting out squeals of excitement as Finn appeared. He was followed by Puck, then Sam, then Artie and Blaine appeared, prompting a very loud squeals from Brittany as he began to sing.

"_Darling, I can't explain_

_Where did we lose our way_

_Girl, it's driving me insane_

_And I know I just need. _

"_One more chance_

_To prove my love to you_

_If you back to me, I'll guarantee_

_That I'll never let you go."_

The four others, Finn sporting the beginnings of a black eye from Kurt's shutting the closet door, joined in for the chorus, smiling at their girlfriends or crushes in the audience while Blaine sang for only Kurt to hear despite the smiles and giggles of the girls.

"_Can we go back to the days_

_Our love was strong_

_Can you tell me how a_

_Perfect love goes wrong?_

"_Can somebody tell me how to get _

_Things back the way they used to be_

_Oh, God, give me a reason_

_I'm down on bended knee."_

Brittany giggled as Puck got down dramatically on one knee, Mercedes tutting loudly at him for ruining the moment. Rachel and Quinn smiled as Blaine continued to sing, meeting each other's eyes and twining their fingers together.

"_I'll never walk again_

_Until you come back to me_

_I'm down on bended knee._

"_So many nights I dream of you_

_Holding my pillow tight_

_I know that I don't need to be alone_

_When I open up my eyes._

"_To face reality, every moment_

_Without you, it seems like eternity_

_I'm begging you, begging you_

_Come back to me."_

The other four boys joined in again, Mike and Rory clapping along to the distinct beat where they sat grinning in encouragement. Santana and Brittany cuddled up together, linking pinkies and Mercedes and Tina exchanged a thumbs-up, smiling at the paralysed, shocked Kurt.

"_Can we go back to the days_

_Our love was strong_

_Can you tell me how a_

_Perfect love goes wrong?_

"_Can somebody tell me how to get _

_Things back the way they used to be_

_Oh, God, give me a reason_

_I'm down on bended knee."_

Tina tiptoed across the room to curl up with Mike and Mercedes patted the bed next to her for Rory, the audience all neatly paired off as tears silently fell from Kurt's eyes and Blaine continued to sing just to him.

"_I'll never walk again_

_Until you come back to me_

_I'm down on bended knee._

"_I'm gonna swallow my pride_

_Say I'm sorry _

_Stop pointing fingers_

_The blame is on me._

"_I want a new life, _

_And I want it with you _

_If you feel the same_

_Don't ever let it go._

"_You gotta believe_

_In the spirit of love_

_It can heal all things_

_We won't hurt any more._

"_No, I don't believe_

_Our love's terminal_

_I'm down on my knees_

_Begging you, please, come home!"_

For the final and passionate chorus, the other four boys only sang quiet back-up, giving all the spotlight gladly to Blaine. Tina smiled at Kurt, hoping that the tears that ran down his face were joyful.

"_Can we go back to the days_

_Our love was strong_

_Can you tell me how a_

_Perfect love goes wrong?_

"_Can somebody tell me how to get _

_Things back the way they used to be_

_Oh, God, give me a reason_

_I'm down on bended knee._

"_Can we go back to the days_

_Our love was strong_

_Can you tell me how a_

_Perfect love goes wrong?_

"_Can somebody tell me how to get _

_Things back the way they used to be_

_Oh, God, give me a reason_

_I'm down on bended knee._

"_I'll never walk again_

_Until you come back to me_

_I'm down on bended knee."_

"I maintain that this was a terrible idea," Santana said loudly as the music faded away. "Songs don't help solve anything."

"Blaine isn't trying to solve it, you dumbass!" Mercedes hissed at her. "He's letting Kurt know he still cares."

"Now we've had that wonderful interpretation of the message in the lyrics, I believe we should give Kurt and Blaine their moment of privacy," Rachel said, standing up and shaking herself out of the dreamy trance the song had put her into. "That's _privacy_, guys!"

"No worries, Rachel," Artie said coolly as they left the room. "There aren't any windows in this door anyway."

When the other twelve had piled out and Santana slammed the door angrily behind her, Blaine cleared his throat. "Kurt, I'm sorry. I lost your trust and I'll never forgive myself. But I still care. A lot. I still love you, Kurt. I don't want to lose you, though I know I deserve to." He took Kurt's still hand, looking into his tear-filled eyes. "I still mean everything I said to you a year ago, Kurt."

Kurt blinked once and tears spilled from his eyes, sliding down his face and leaving glittering trails on his skin, illuminated by the flickering candlelight. Blaine pressed his lips to the tears, kissing them tenderly away. His mouth moved to Kurt's and everything blurred into a haze of flickering yellow-orange light and the musky scent of millions of roses.

"Blaine, you betrayed me," Kurt murmured as they parted, opening his eyes slowly. "It won't be the same. I just can't trust you any more."

"Kurt, every time I see you my heart reminds me that you are the _one_," Blaine whispered, holding tight to Kurt's hand, other hand cupping Kurt's cheek. "I love you, and all I want is you by my side again. I can build up your trust again, I'll do anything. _Please_, Kurt."

"Blaine, I…thank you," Kurt murmured awkwardly. "Thank you for what you did. Santana may not have appreciated it, but it was perfect. And I love you." Blaine moved away, pulled a box from his pocket and got down on one knee. "Blaine, are you _proposing_?" Kurt choked out.

Blaine shook his head once, smiling and opening the box to show two rings that entwined to form one ring. "They're promise rings," Blaine explained. "As long as I wear this in your name, Kurt Hummel, I will always love you, never betray you and be here for you, no matter whether you want a friend or a lover. Kurt Hummel, will you accept this ring I give freely as a promise of my love?"

"I…I will," Kurt murmured in a voice that shook with suppressed tears. Blaine smiled up at him and they exchanged rings in silence.

"I promise," Blaine whispered as he shut the empty box and slid it back into his pocket, never letting go of Kurt's hand, "the moment we're living in a state that legalises it, we'll swap them for engagement rings."

"I love you," Kurt said simply, tears running down his face. Blaine kissed the tears away and kissed him, slow and soft.

The rest of New Directions left after half an hour of standing outside the door, unable to see or eavesdrop. Deciding against staying in the house which was empty of anyone but Kurt, Blaine and himself, Finn went to stay with Puck. Quinn and Rachel blew out the candles that lined the path to heaven, but left the roses. The pair of them left together with the other girls, all of them discussing the apparent success of the plan and resolving to congratulate Blaine when they saw him.

In the candlelit room where the musky scent of the rich red roses hung seductively on the air, Kurt and Blaine found perfect bliss in each other, in whispered endearments that grew more incomprehensible with every hour that passed, in tender caresses that elicited gasps from both, in long lazy kisses that grew ever more heated as the sun sank below the horizon and the crescent moon lit up the velvet sky.

Together, they rose to the star-scattered sky, danced on the bitter wind that blew bare branches in an elegant dance, found love against the backdrop of inky midnight black. They brought each other to heaven and whispered those three words all through the night, making love until the sun rose and sleep finally took them in its gentle arms.

* * *

><p>The song Blaine and the ND 'alpha males' sang is <em>On Bended Knees<em> - Boyz II Men. Pretty much cheesy as anything, but...yeah, whatever, it's a Klaine song and that makes it amazing ;)

If you like this enough, please don't favourite without reviewing, thanks :D


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